Waking up in the bath was always
tough. The enamel left her head feeling bruised, her legs were always crumpled
up and pressing into the taps, and inevitably something would fall over and
leak onto her. Bubble bath is much less relaxing when it’s seeping steadily
into your leggings over a six hour period.
Cassie was sure that the bath wasn’t actually spinning – if she was the owner of a rotating bath then it would be something she remembered. At least, she hoped it would be – right now she didn’t remember much, so it was all a bit of a gambit. Never-the-less, the spinning motion she felt must have been inside her head, which meant that stopping it would be terribly difficult indeed. Taking one of the few measures she could to assert some equilibrium into the proceedings, she forced her eyes open, despite the protestations of her dry eyeballs.
As the dim early-morning light entered Cassie’s dilated and furious pupils, some of the imaginary rotation she’d been hosting took its leave of her. Having it stick around when the information from her eyes pointed out that the room was quite stationary would only cause conflict, and confrontation was the last thing the situation called for. Still, conflict or none, and bath or not, she was once again stable. This was a good starting point for either getting up, or falling back to sleep, and so the world was truly Cassie’s oyster in that moment. Unfortunately, her mouth tasted very much like she’d eaten an oyster who’d been fished out of a brewery, and that fact cast an unpleasant pall over her otherwise tolerable situation.
Trying not to touch the inside of her mouth with her tongue, which is rather difficult when that’s where one’s tongue lives, Cassie decided that falling back to sleep was the only rational choice to be made. She was still tired, it wasn’t very light, and she could probably put up with the skull-flattening effect of an enamel pillow for a little while longer. She lifted her legs to rest her feet on the rim, one between the taps and one to the side, and slid deeper into the bath. Closing her eyes again, she willed herself not to think about how uncomfortable she was, and drifted back into an undignified slumber.
She dreamed of standing by a road at the top of a hill. A pigeon was eating seeds around the base of a keep-left sign, bobbing its head around and flapping occasionally. She wondered why someone had left seeds in the road, then noticed that the keep left sign was a vending machine for bird seed, and the pigeon was inserting coins from a leather purse. Cassie was impressed, and wanted to get a closer look – she stepped into the road, which was now tiled like the floor of supermarket, and approached the pigeon. It was using human arms from under its wings to deal with the operation of the seed-dispenser, and Cassie noticed a wedding ring on one of the fingers.
‘I suppose it’s for the best to have that question nipped in the bud’ she thought to herself, with the faintest air of disappointment.
The pigeon finally noticed her approaching and cooed loudly, but continued its transaction with the vending machine. It then cooed loudly again, which Cassie somehow understood as a warning that she was walking blindly across a road. She looked right, and saw an estate car careening towards her.
Everything slowed down – Cassie saw herself standing in the road, and screamed at her body to move, but she remained still. The vehicle crept ever closer, and Cassie tried harder to shout at herself and rouse her own attention, but there was no effect – she remained motionless and the gap grew smaller. At the last second, with all the effort she could muster, Cassie forced her body to leap to the side with its legs kicking wildly – towards the pigeon and out of the path of the vehicle. She landed hard on the ground, striking her shin against a hitherto unseen colander. Cassie stood up and prepared to make an apology to the pigeon for landing on his kitchen utensils. She also felt that she should thank it for warning her about the traffic, but was stopped in her tracks again when she saw that it was facing her with its beak open, and gallons of water were gushing out. It began to flood the area impossibly quickly, rising up to her knees and soaking her legs. It was cold, much colder than she would have expected, having come out of a well-fed bird, and made a hissing sound not unlike that of a running…
Cassie awoke again with a start, and cold water was flowing freely from the tap, soaking her leggings. She flinched violently, once again slapping her leg into the tap handle and increasing the flow rate. Frantically, she scrabbled backwards away from the water, frothing her bubble-bath leggings into a fearsome lather as she went. With terrified passion, she gripped the sides of the bath with her hands and pushed herself upwards, whilst her feet slipped ineffectually in the suds. The bubbles became ever-thicker around her legs as she struggled. On the bright-side, however, a powerful scent of lavender was beginning to fill the room, rather than the typically reminiscent aroma of a brewery.
After a few seconds of intense conflict against gravity and lubrication, Cassie managed to scramble to her feet. She stepped cautiously but urgently from the bathtub, then turned off the tap and sighed with relief. Her head was no longer spinning, which was one positive to be drawn, but it still felt like someone had been attempting to inflate her brain with a bicycle pump. Having wet legs did nothing to remedy the situation.
Cassie looked down at herself, a thick layer of bubbles extending from her knees downwards. She was unreasonably frothy, she decided. This level of bubbliness in the morning, especially so concentrated around the legs, was simply unacceptable.
‘Living the dream’ Cassie thought to herself, sarcastically. ’At least I smell pretty good. I might be able to get away without washing these now.’
Cassie stood there, next to the bath, allowing herself a small feeling of self-satisfaction, and briefly considering whether or not this counted as having done some laundry. These feelings were soon superseded, however, by the chill of her soaked legs.
‘I need to take these off. If I wear them for much longer I’d have to wash them again anyway.’ She thought to herself, focusing on entirely the wrong consequence of standing around in saturated and foamy clothing. Having hiked her skirt up and hooked her thumbs into the waist band of her leggings, she pulled downwards, peeling the saturated fabric away from her legs and leaving an impressive amount of foam on her skin.
Once she had finished, she caught sight of herself in the full-length mirror. Her long black hair was tangled and unkempt, having tried very hard to take the shape of the bath. Her top was twisted and lopsided, and her skirt was hiked up around her waist. Her legs were bare, wet and foamy, and she was holding what looked like a poorly-washed and highly-depressed cat.
‘You are one classy dame, Cassie.’ She said to herself.
Cassie looked down at the mess of black elasticated cotton and lavender scented foam in her hands, and tossed it casually into the bath. That was a situation which could bear to wait until later. Turning away from the bubbly tub of future problems, she grabbed a towel from the rack and dried herself off.
‘OK. I’ve had quite enough time in the bathroom.’ She told herself, and pulled the door open to leave her makeshift sleeping quarters. In doing so, she stepped directly onto the remains of the sandwich she’d made herself before going to bed. Or, more accurately, before going to bath.
‘Ugh!’ she exclaimed, understandably. ‘Why is there a sandwich here?’ she begged the empty landing, but it lacked sufficient feelings of charity to respond. Then the memory of the sandwich’s origins came gradually back to Cassie, with a defeated ‘Oooh’.
Cassie had been hungry when she and Sarah had got back in last night, so she’d made a sandwich for herself. At some stage after the creation of the sandwich, Cassie’s need for the loo had become overwhelming – she was far closer to wetting herself than was reasonable for any healthy human adult. In order to remedy this, she’d headed towards the lavatory, but admitted to herself that the perilous bathroom was no place for such a young and innocent sandwich. With risky scenarios such as the toilet-drop, the sink plunge, and even an outside chance of the shampoo-saucing, the dangers were all too real. Cassie had placed her snack safely on the floor outside the doorway and headed in to conduct her urgent business.
After mourning her lost snack and the unpleasant sensations being experienced by her toes, as well as a short trip back to the bath to rinse her foot, Cassie stepped carefully over the now squashed sandwich and headed towards the bedroom to get dressed. The food-floor situation could be addressed in the fullness of time.
The bedroom door was closed, which meant that Sarah was probably still asleep in there; the utmost caution and stealth would be required. Very slowly and carefully, Cassie pushed the handle down and leant into the door, gradually sliding it open over the soft bedroom carpet. The quiet swooshing sound of the door and carpet gave way to a gentle, if rattling, breathing coming from the direction of the bed, and Cassie tip-toed her way into the room. Her own side of the bed was the farthest from the doorway, and therefore both her chest of drawers and her pile of discarded clothing were similarly distant. A silent circumnavigation was necessary.
Cassie picked her way over the little black dress which Sarah had been wearing last night, and tried to avoid placing her foot on the collection of discarded hair pins. A short spell of hopping and silent cursing punctuated her failure in that regard. Cassie’s mind was screaming at Sarah for not putting them on the bedside table, and she looked at the hair-care perpetrator to complete her judgement, but in doing so the rage quickly melted away again. Sarah was sleeping soundly on her front, breath still rattling away, with her arm dangling off the bed and one foot poking out a fold in the duvet. Looking at the ungainly human spillage, which filled the bed and called itself Cassie’s other half, Cassie’s righteous fury dissipated despite the determined protestations coming from the injured foot. Cassie broke a smile (within the warranty period, so no harm done) and put her foot down again, straight back onto the hair pins.
A second bout of quiet swearing later, Cassie pushed on past the minefield laid down by her sleepy companion, and reached her chest of drawers. She pulled open the middle drawer and gazed hungrily as it unveiled a small portion of her impressive ‘mong-out’ collection. The mong-out collection was the subset of Cassie’s wardrobe which was particularly suited to doing very little indeed. There were always local variations in the amount of clothing in the mong-out collection – generally, whatever Cassie woke up in after a Friday night out became an honorary member for the day – but the core constituents were laid in front of Cassie in this moment. The pyjamas were a workhorse; cosy, comfortable, and a clear message to anyone who saw her that if she achieved a single thing that day then it would be too much. The dressing gown strewn across the floor nearby was another classic choice, but having to occasionally re-tie the belt was far too much effort for today. Brushing aside old jeans and stretched t-shirts, Cassie settled on her old university hoodie and a pair of sweatpants – it was a full-slob situation.
Cassie changed quickly, in the well-practised manner of a serial monger, and crept her way back out of the bedroom. She had been tempted to wake Sarah so that she could say ‘good morning’, but elected against it when another memory popped itself back into existence.
Cassie and Sarah had been standing at the top of the stairs, discussing something inane, when Cassie had claimed she’d ‘wake with the lark and bask in the pre-dawn glow of a hangover-free day.’ Sarah had then declared ‘I love you very much Cassie, but if you bask too loudly and wake me up early, I will cut you.’
Cassie was at least 80% sure that Sarah had been joking about cutting her, but it didn’t feel like a risk worth taking at this stage. That went double, since promises of a ‘hangover-free day’ were clearly a fabrication. Sarah would probably wake up of her own accord soon enough, and then no-one had to gamble with potential knife-crime. For now, the best plan of action was to head downstairs, make the best she could of the rest of the morning, if it even was morning still, and await the naturally-stirring cutting-free Sarah.
After collecting the squashed remains of last night’s sandwich from outside the bathroom door, having declared this moment to be ‘the fullness of time’, Cassie went down the staircase. Around half way down, she noticed that the hallway had rather more shoes strewn around it than usual. In fact, according to Cassie’s rough count, approximately all of her and Sarah’s shoes were tastefully sprinkled around the floor. She didn’t recall events 100% clearly, but she was fairly sure she had not in fact been wearing all the shoes she owned last night. Quite aside from the trouble she would have faced in fitting them all onto her feet, she would have clashed horribly with herself; there’s no way Sarah would have let that fly. The sheer volume of shoes involved here implied that this was an endeavour of passion and determination, and there was no good explanation for that. Unfortunately, Cassie knew from experience that the lack of a good explanation for what she was seeing often meant that there was only a bad one; bad explanations are often worse than no explanation at all.
The shoe situation didn’t need to be dealt with right now, much like the soggy leggings – the priority call had already been made to sate her perishing thirst, of which Cassie had become cognizant whilst sneaking around the bedroom. She waded through the footwear lake, leaving a wake of sling-backs and causing a bough-wave of open-toed sandals, and entered the kitchen.
Clearly, things had not run smoothly last night when she had been attempting to relieve her crippling hunger. In many ways, this should have been anticipated not only from Cassie’s choice of shoe distribution and sleeping quarters, but also the fact that the sandwich had been casually abandoned outside of the bathroom door. The kitchen was in disarray; cupboard doors were open, dirty glasses covered the work surface, and packets of crisps and biscuits were dangling out of cupboards precariously or scattered around the room. Interspersed among the many used cups and plates from the night before were straws, cutlery, and items from Cassie’s handbag. Half a cucumber had been crammed into the spigot of the kettle, the majority of a lettuce was sprinkled across the floor, and the butter was bobbing merrily along in the sink – a yellow plastic vessel, holding the souls of hydrogenated sink-farers in melted memorial. Cassie wasn’t sure what she felt the most: remorse that she’d have to go out to get more butter, or proud that drunk-Cassie had been responsible enough to try to do the washing up. It was a bit of a moot point though, because either way this evidence HAD to be destroyed before Sarah became aware of it. It wasn’t so much a telling-off that Cassie feared, as the relentless piss-taking which would surely follow.
Cassie grabbed the cucumber, and found that it had been thoroughly buttered, presumably in some kind of inebriated zeal. Begrudgingly, Cassie had to admit that there was a distorted logic to the situation – a well-greased cucumber had a much greater chance of making it into the kettle. The motivation for trying to achieve that end goal was doomed to remain a mystery, however. Grimacing, but accepting that what’s done is done, Cassie decided that she should simply wipe the cucumber clean and forget that this whole sorry mess ever happened. In reaching for the kitchen roll, she discovered that the fates had other plans for her – it was gone, leaving her clutching a buttery sandwich-filler and many, many regrets. She couldn’t just put the cucumber back on the side, because that would get butter everywhere and probably soil the dairy-coated article further. She especially wasn’t going to use the sink because that would involve one or both of the cucumber and her hand entering the cold, untrustworthy water. She had to find the kitchen roll.
It hadn’t been in the bathroom, so that was one potential hiding place out. The landing had also been clear, as far as Cassie remembered, but the bedroom had been dark, and therefore little data had been gathered. On balance, though, Cassie didn’t think it was terribly likely that Sarah would have taken the kitchen roll to bed with her. There was a possibility that the kitchen roll had been scuttled and sunk beneath the surface of the shoe-lake, but there was no way Cassie was going to risk getting her shoes buttery. The most logical place to begin her search was the living room, so off she waded, back through the shoes, to find her absorbent prize.
The living room curtains were drawn shut. Cassie used her free hand to pull them open and allow the sunshine to spill into the room from the back garden. This also allowed the cereal box which had, for reasons lost in time, been sitting atop the curtain pole to drop down onto her head.
“AAAH!” Cassie shouted understandably, having not expected breakfast to perform an aerial strike on her. The cornflakes crunched to the ground, spilling slightly onto the laminate, and Cassie eyed them askance.
“Why?” she muttered to herself in distress, before cracking a smile and giggling to herself.
The morning light unveiled the living room, which seemed to have escaped relatively unscathed from the night’s shenanigans. The sofas were still intact, the TV was thankfully unbroken, and there was relatively little mess of which to speak. The cushions had be rearranged onto the floor, but that wasn’t the end of the world. Scanning around the room, a flash of white caught Cassie’s eye, and she saw the kitchen roll nestled underneath the coffee table. It seemed rather happy there; not mopping up spilt drinks or sauces, but having a little rest on the floor. Cassie wasn’t going to judge it for that – she’d been in a far worse position only a few minutes ago.
Taking care not to butter the coffee table or the floor with her cucumber, Cassie knelt down and reached underneath the coffee table to retrieve the kitchen roll. She took hold of one edge and yanked it out, unspooling several feet of it as she did so. Standing up again, the loose sheets were trailing along the ground, even when she lifted the roll above her head. This was no good to her at all – all achieved was losing the use of her free hand, and she still lack the ability to wipe the cucumber clean. Cassie looked from one hand to the other, assessing her possible routes forward, and with a frustrated groan she admitted defeat – she would seek the aid of a slightly more responsible adult and wake up Sarah.
Deflated, Cassie plodded her way back up the stairs and into the bedroom, kitchen roll drifting along behind her like the train of an absorbent wedding dress. Sarah was still sprawled out across the bed, washed ashore by the gallons of wine she’d surfed home on last night. Lifeguard Cassie had chosen the buttered cucumber and loose kitchen roll as resuscitation aids – the potential definitely existed that she was unqualified.
“Sarah?” Cassie called softly. “Sarah, are you awake?”
Sarah continued breathing heavily, which was her usual way of saying no.
“Sarah, I think I need your help. Sarah. Sarah.” Still nothing. Actions speak louder than words, however, so Cassie was practically screaming when she balanced precariously on one leg and poked Sarah with her foot.
“Ungg.” Sarah complained.
“Sarah?” Cassie asked again, feeling pretty sure that she was addressing the correct person, but enquiring anyway.
“Hnng, yeah?” Sarah replied sleepily.
“I think I need some help.” Cassie told her sheepishly. Sarah open her eyes and looked towards Cassie.
“What the Christ are… is that a cucumber?”
“Er, yeah. I’ve got some kitchen roll too.”
Sarah spluttered out a laugh. “Of course you have. They’re very nice; I’m glad you’ve brought them up here to meet me. Why do you need my help?”
“Well, the cucumber is covered in butter and-“
Sarah began cackling.
“-and I can’t put it down to break off the kitchen roll to wipe it clean.” Cassie finished, sincerely.
Sarah looked up and saw the trail of kitchen roll leading towards the door, then fell back onto the bed laughing even harder. Cassie relaxed slightly, feeling that the risk of a cutting was now negligible.
After a minute or so of alternately trying to compose herself, looking back at Cassie, and then folding up in laughter, Sarah sat up again. She examined Cassie more closely, from the buttery cucumber to the streamer of kitchen roll, and what appeared to be cornflakes in her bedraggled hair. ‘Poor little Chicky.’ She thought.
“OK… OK… come here, let me help you with that. Give me the kitchen roll and keep the butter away from the duvet. How do you get yourself into these situations?” she pleaded with a grin, as she began gathering up the unfurled paper towels.
“I went downstairs and made the mistake of trying to tidy up. Then the cornflakes fell on my head.”
“How did the cornfl-“
“They fell off the curtain rail in the living room.”
Sarah collapsed in laughter again. “I remember that! I remember getting in and you telling me how much you needed snacks. So we went into the kitchen and searched for something to eat in the cupboards, but you said you were also… what was it… “far too weary for these shenanigans”, so you had to go sit down in the living room to come to terms with how tired and hungry you were.”
Cassie smiled as the memory limped its way back into her mind. “I remember going to sit down, now that you mention it.”
“Yeah, you went in there and I thought that you’d maybe like some cornflakes – mostly because they were the first thing I saw and I just wanted to go to bed, truth be told – so I went to the door and threw them at you.”
“And you missed so badly that they landed on the curtains?” Cassie sniggered.
“Not quite, my love.” Sarah replied with a smirk. “Rather than catching the thing you’d asked me to give you, you decided to defend yourself and deflect it like a volleyball. You caught it so badly that it landed on the curtains.” She finished triumphantly.
Cassie started to put her head in her hands and promptly wiped butter on her cheek.
“Uggghh” she squealed. “Please Sarah.”
Unable to ignore the desperate pleas of her greased fiancée any longer, Sarah swung herself out of bed and tore off a sheet of kitchen roll for cucumber reconditioning. She then got back into the bed to watch and mock as appropriate.
“Thanks Sarah.” Cassie said quietly, with a note of amusement and a symphony of embarrassment.
“Any time you need me to bail you out of a spread and vegetable situation, I’ll be there. I think it’s time you told me how you got yourself into this mess though.”
Wiping the cucumber over, Cassie replied “Well, I tried it to pick it up, and it was buttery. Then I tried to pick up the kitchen roll and it was a bit, erm, tumbly.”
“And how did the cucumber come to be buttery?”
Cassie toyed with speculating about lubrication for kettle ingress, then decided that no good would come of admitting to that. “I don’t really remember.”
A disbelieving look from Sarah implied that her explanation was insufficient.
“I don’t!” Cassie protested.
“Well I didn’t do it, so you must have.”
“Well, yeah. I’m pretty it sure it will have been me. I guess it was when I was making my sandwich, perhaps I was over-enthusiastic with the spreading.”
“Or pre-buttered the cucumber to save time on a subsequent sandwich?” Sarah offered.
“Yeah, maybe.” The cucumber was now clean, and Cassie was admiring her handiwork.
“Was the sandwich nice?”
“I can’t comment on its flavour, but it felt pretty horrible when I stepped on it this morning.”
Sarah laughed again. “I love you Cassie. Never change.” She said when she’d regained some composure.
“I had a foody foot OK! It happens; leave me alone about it!” Cassie replied, attempting to be grumpy but failing not to grin. “I love you too.” She added after a pause. “Anyway, I need to finish clearing up downstairs; why don’t you just stay in bed?”
Sarah eyed Cassie suspiciously. “What don’t you want me to see? How bad is it down there?”
“I came up here with a buttery cucumber, how bad do you think it is?” Cassie answered, brandishing her cleaned vegetable at Sarah.
A heavy sigh was the only answer Cassie received. Sarah closed her eyes, nodded her head and laid back down. Cassie picked up the kitchen roll from the bed, kissed Sarah on the cheek, and returned downstairs.
Back in the kitchen, Cassie returned the cucumber to the fridge and surveyed the situation facing her. It would have been a tedious enough task anyway, but with an unknown layer of additional sandwich mess to account for, clearing up could stretch into the hours.
‘Can I really be bothered with this on my own?’ Cassie thought to herself. ‘Sarah won’t mind helping me that much. Although she must be tired and want to sleep. She won’t want to get up to face... this. And the years of ridicule may not be worth it.’
Conflicted, and staring deeply into the SS butter, which was resting calmly on the sink-water’s surface, Cassie’s ears pricked to the sound of footsteps from above – Sarah was getting up anyway. There was no way to hide the filth in time – she would have to accept her fate and face Sarah’s reaction. Cassie felt a small pang of guilt that Sarah would end up helping her clean the mess whatever happened, even though she deserved a day off, but it was still caught in a deadly combat with her desire for an easier task.
Scrabbling in futility, Cassie grabbed a handful of lettuce leaves from the floor and stuffed them into a pint glass – that was a much better place for them. As she then attempted to hide the glass behind some empty wine bottles, however, she heard a shout from the staircase.
“MY SHOES!” Sarah cried, thundering down the stairs. “Why are my shoes all over the floor? Cassie?”
Cassie left the glass where it was and rushed to the kitchen doorway.
“I don’t know. I don’t remember doing it – I thought it might have been you.” She postulated. The look on Sarah’s face, somewhere between horrified, confused, and sceptical, informed Cassie that the redistribution of footwear on such a scale was not something with which she would have involved herself.
“I don’t remember doing it either, and I don’t recall wading through my nice heels to get to bed.”
Cassie shrugged. “I don’t see why I’d have done it. It would have taken ages and all I was concerned about was snacks. Unless I tried to eat the shoes instead – are there bite marks on any of them?”
Sarah looked stonily at Cassie. “If there are bite marks on my shoes, I think we can agree that you won’t want me to see them.”
“You really think I’d bite your shoes?” Cassie shot back, a little hurt at the accusation of being a cobbler-gobbler.
“No smoke without fire.” Sarah defended. She then paused thoughtfully, for longer than Cassie felt was necessary. “Although it doesn’t sound like something you’d do, no.”
“Good.”
“I need some water in any case – can I get through to the kitchen please?”
Cassie tensed. The kitchen filth had been given much higher priority in terms of being hidden from Sarah than the shoes, and so she feared a proportionately worse response.
“I can get that for you.” Cassie spluttered too quickly. “Don’t you want to go back to bed?”
Sarah’s eyes narrowed. “What are you hiding in there?”
“Nothing! Nothing. I just thought that you might want to lie down after the shoe shock.”
Sarah considered this answer for a couple of seconds. “Bullcrap.” Came her insightful assessment. “Let me see what’s going on.”
Like a surefooted mountain goat, Sarah navigated the loose rocks of footwear and stepped into the kitchen. She then curled up on the floor, in a nest of lettuce, laughing at the mayhem to which she had borne witness.
“Wha… what is wrong with you?” Sarah managed to splutter breathlessly, between bouts of cackling.
“I clearly struggled, alright? We both know it.” Cassie gracefully conceded. Sarah gradually regained control, stood back up, and put her hand on Cassie’s shoulder.
“It’s OK baby – sandwich-making out-foxes even the best of us.” Sarah told her mockingly.
“Oh, shut your face.”
“No, I mean it. It makes perfect sense to throw the lettuce everywhere in the room. Some of it is bound to land on the bread sooner or later.”
Cassie crossed her arms grumpily. “See, this is exactly why I wanted to hide it from you.”
“Aww, cheer up Chicky.” Sarah told her with a wry smile. “I’m only playing.” Cassie eyed her suspiciously – when Sarah was feeling playful it generally meant that there was no end in sight to the constructive jibes. At least the guilt of letting Sarah get up to help had faded to nothing.
“Besides” Sarah continued “who could possibly be sad when you’ve got a whole pint of lettuce to enjoy?” She thrust the glass of leaves merrily into the air and then bent over in a fit of giggles again.
“Well I’m glad you’re having fun.” Cassie said sarcastically, failing to avoid smirking as she did so.
“There’s nothing I like waking up to more than a ruined kitchen and wet butter.”
“Don’t forget a buttery kettle.” Cassie reminded her.
“Eh?” Sarah replied with intrigue. Cassie pointed at the kettle and Sarah sighed. “How did this happen?”
“Where do you think the cucumber came from?”
Sarah slapped her hands to her face. “There aren’t words, Cassie. There just aren’t words.”
“Not even, ‘Wow, I’m impressed?’” Cassie asked optimistically.
“Not quite, my love. Not quite. Breakfast?”
“I could murder a fry up. But I think that would involve clearing all this up first…” Cassie’s expression betrayed no desire to engage in such an activity. With her antics already rumbled, there was no longer any motivation to hide the evidence of her nocturnal misdeeds.
“Hmm. Yes it would. I think this situation can bear to wait until we’re feeling more responsible. Café? My treat – you’ve given me so much already this morning, I feel the need to repay you. Besides, you’ve already got our shoes out for us so we’re basically ready to go.”
“You’re not going to stop this any time soon, are you?”
“Almost certainly not.” Sarah informed Cassie with a grin.
“Then I’d rather be ridiculed over breakfast than the washing up. I guess. Let’s go.” Cassie said decisively, grabbing Sarah’s hand. Unfortunately for Sarah, Cassie hadn’t washed it since holding the cucumber.
“Ugh! Cassie!” was how Sarah chose to articulate her distaste.
“What’s done is done!” she responded, and so they left; hand-in-buttery-hand.
Cassie was sure that the bath wasn’t actually spinning – if she was the owner of a rotating bath then it would be something she remembered. At least, she hoped it would be – right now she didn’t remember much, so it was all a bit of a gambit. Never-the-less, the spinning motion she felt must have been inside her head, which meant that stopping it would be terribly difficult indeed. Taking one of the few measures she could to assert some equilibrium into the proceedings, she forced her eyes open, despite the protestations of her dry eyeballs.
As the dim early-morning light entered Cassie’s dilated and furious pupils, some of the imaginary rotation she’d been hosting took its leave of her. Having it stick around when the information from her eyes pointed out that the room was quite stationary would only cause conflict, and confrontation was the last thing the situation called for. Still, conflict or none, and bath or not, she was once again stable. This was a good starting point for either getting up, or falling back to sleep, and so the world was truly Cassie’s oyster in that moment. Unfortunately, her mouth tasted very much like she’d eaten an oyster who’d been fished out of a brewery, and that fact cast an unpleasant pall over her otherwise tolerable situation.
Trying not to touch the inside of her mouth with her tongue, which is rather difficult when that’s where one’s tongue lives, Cassie decided that falling back to sleep was the only rational choice to be made. She was still tired, it wasn’t very light, and she could probably put up with the skull-flattening effect of an enamel pillow for a little while longer. She lifted her legs to rest her feet on the rim, one between the taps and one to the side, and slid deeper into the bath. Closing her eyes again, she willed herself not to think about how uncomfortable she was, and drifted back into an undignified slumber.
She dreamed of standing by a road at the top of a hill. A pigeon was eating seeds around the base of a keep-left sign, bobbing its head around and flapping occasionally. She wondered why someone had left seeds in the road, then noticed that the keep left sign was a vending machine for bird seed, and the pigeon was inserting coins from a leather purse. Cassie was impressed, and wanted to get a closer look – she stepped into the road, which was now tiled like the floor of supermarket, and approached the pigeon. It was using human arms from under its wings to deal with the operation of the seed-dispenser, and Cassie noticed a wedding ring on one of the fingers.
‘I suppose it’s for the best to have that question nipped in the bud’ she thought to herself, with the faintest air of disappointment.
The pigeon finally noticed her approaching and cooed loudly, but continued its transaction with the vending machine. It then cooed loudly again, which Cassie somehow understood as a warning that she was walking blindly across a road. She looked right, and saw an estate car careening towards her.
Everything slowed down – Cassie saw herself standing in the road, and screamed at her body to move, but she remained still. The vehicle crept ever closer, and Cassie tried harder to shout at herself and rouse her own attention, but there was no effect – she remained motionless and the gap grew smaller. At the last second, with all the effort she could muster, Cassie forced her body to leap to the side with its legs kicking wildly – towards the pigeon and out of the path of the vehicle. She landed hard on the ground, striking her shin against a hitherto unseen colander. Cassie stood up and prepared to make an apology to the pigeon for landing on his kitchen utensils. She also felt that she should thank it for warning her about the traffic, but was stopped in her tracks again when she saw that it was facing her with its beak open, and gallons of water were gushing out. It began to flood the area impossibly quickly, rising up to her knees and soaking her legs. It was cold, much colder than she would have expected, having come out of a well-fed bird, and made a hissing sound not unlike that of a running…
Cassie awoke again with a start, and cold water was flowing freely from the tap, soaking her leggings. She flinched violently, once again slapping her leg into the tap handle and increasing the flow rate. Frantically, she scrabbled backwards away from the water, frothing her bubble-bath leggings into a fearsome lather as she went. With terrified passion, she gripped the sides of the bath with her hands and pushed herself upwards, whilst her feet slipped ineffectually in the suds. The bubbles became ever-thicker around her legs as she struggled. On the bright-side, however, a powerful scent of lavender was beginning to fill the room, rather than the typically reminiscent aroma of a brewery.
After a few seconds of intense conflict against gravity and lubrication, Cassie managed to scramble to her feet. She stepped cautiously but urgently from the bathtub, then turned off the tap and sighed with relief. Her head was no longer spinning, which was one positive to be drawn, but it still felt like someone had been attempting to inflate her brain with a bicycle pump. Having wet legs did nothing to remedy the situation.
Cassie looked down at herself, a thick layer of bubbles extending from her knees downwards. She was unreasonably frothy, she decided. This level of bubbliness in the morning, especially so concentrated around the legs, was simply unacceptable.
‘Living the dream’ Cassie thought to herself, sarcastically. ’At least I smell pretty good. I might be able to get away without washing these now.’
Cassie stood there, next to the bath, allowing herself a small feeling of self-satisfaction, and briefly considering whether or not this counted as having done some laundry. These feelings were soon superseded, however, by the chill of her soaked legs.
‘I need to take these off. If I wear them for much longer I’d have to wash them again anyway.’ She thought to herself, focusing on entirely the wrong consequence of standing around in saturated and foamy clothing. Having hiked her skirt up and hooked her thumbs into the waist band of her leggings, she pulled downwards, peeling the saturated fabric away from her legs and leaving an impressive amount of foam on her skin.
Once she had finished, she caught sight of herself in the full-length mirror. Her long black hair was tangled and unkempt, having tried very hard to take the shape of the bath. Her top was twisted and lopsided, and her skirt was hiked up around her waist. Her legs were bare, wet and foamy, and she was holding what looked like a poorly-washed and highly-depressed cat.
‘You are one classy dame, Cassie.’ She said to herself.
Cassie looked down at the mess of black elasticated cotton and lavender scented foam in her hands, and tossed it casually into the bath. That was a situation which could bear to wait until later. Turning away from the bubbly tub of future problems, she grabbed a towel from the rack and dried herself off.
‘OK. I’ve had quite enough time in the bathroom.’ She told herself, and pulled the door open to leave her makeshift sleeping quarters. In doing so, she stepped directly onto the remains of the sandwich she’d made herself before going to bed. Or, more accurately, before going to bath.
‘Ugh!’ she exclaimed, understandably. ‘Why is there a sandwich here?’ she begged the empty landing, but it lacked sufficient feelings of charity to respond. Then the memory of the sandwich’s origins came gradually back to Cassie, with a defeated ‘Oooh’.
Cassie had been hungry when she and Sarah had got back in last night, so she’d made a sandwich for herself. At some stage after the creation of the sandwich, Cassie’s need for the loo had become overwhelming – she was far closer to wetting herself than was reasonable for any healthy human adult. In order to remedy this, she’d headed towards the lavatory, but admitted to herself that the perilous bathroom was no place for such a young and innocent sandwich. With risky scenarios such as the toilet-drop, the sink plunge, and even an outside chance of the shampoo-saucing, the dangers were all too real. Cassie had placed her snack safely on the floor outside the doorway and headed in to conduct her urgent business.
After mourning her lost snack and the unpleasant sensations being experienced by her toes, as well as a short trip back to the bath to rinse her foot, Cassie stepped carefully over the now squashed sandwich and headed towards the bedroom to get dressed. The food-floor situation could be addressed in the fullness of time.
The bedroom door was closed, which meant that Sarah was probably still asleep in there; the utmost caution and stealth would be required. Very slowly and carefully, Cassie pushed the handle down and leant into the door, gradually sliding it open over the soft bedroom carpet. The quiet swooshing sound of the door and carpet gave way to a gentle, if rattling, breathing coming from the direction of the bed, and Cassie tip-toed her way into the room. Her own side of the bed was the farthest from the doorway, and therefore both her chest of drawers and her pile of discarded clothing were similarly distant. A silent circumnavigation was necessary.
Cassie picked her way over the little black dress which Sarah had been wearing last night, and tried to avoid placing her foot on the collection of discarded hair pins. A short spell of hopping and silent cursing punctuated her failure in that regard. Cassie’s mind was screaming at Sarah for not putting them on the bedside table, and she looked at the hair-care perpetrator to complete her judgement, but in doing so the rage quickly melted away again. Sarah was sleeping soundly on her front, breath still rattling away, with her arm dangling off the bed and one foot poking out a fold in the duvet. Looking at the ungainly human spillage, which filled the bed and called itself Cassie’s other half, Cassie’s righteous fury dissipated despite the determined protestations coming from the injured foot. Cassie broke a smile (within the warranty period, so no harm done) and put her foot down again, straight back onto the hair pins.
A second bout of quiet swearing later, Cassie pushed on past the minefield laid down by her sleepy companion, and reached her chest of drawers. She pulled open the middle drawer and gazed hungrily as it unveiled a small portion of her impressive ‘mong-out’ collection. The mong-out collection was the subset of Cassie’s wardrobe which was particularly suited to doing very little indeed. There were always local variations in the amount of clothing in the mong-out collection – generally, whatever Cassie woke up in after a Friday night out became an honorary member for the day – but the core constituents were laid in front of Cassie in this moment. The pyjamas were a workhorse; cosy, comfortable, and a clear message to anyone who saw her that if she achieved a single thing that day then it would be too much. The dressing gown strewn across the floor nearby was another classic choice, but having to occasionally re-tie the belt was far too much effort for today. Brushing aside old jeans and stretched t-shirts, Cassie settled on her old university hoodie and a pair of sweatpants – it was a full-slob situation.
Cassie changed quickly, in the well-practised manner of a serial monger, and crept her way back out of the bedroom. She had been tempted to wake Sarah so that she could say ‘good morning’, but elected against it when another memory popped itself back into existence.
Cassie and Sarah had been standing at the top of the stairs, discussing something inane, when Cassie had claimed she’d ‘wake with the lark and bask in the pre-dawn glow of a hangover-free day.’ Sarah had then declared ‘I love you very much Cassie, but if you bask too loudly and wake me up early, I will cut you.’
Cassie was at least 80% sure that Sarah had been joking about cutting her, but it didn’t feel like a risk worth taking at this stage. That went double, since promises of a ‘hangover-free day’ were clearly a fabrication. Sarah would probably wake up of her own accord soon enough, and then no-one had to gamble with potential knife-crime. For now, the best plan of action was to head downstairs, make the best she could of the rest of the morning, if it even was morning still, and await the naturally-stirring cutting-free Sarah.
After collecting the squashed remains of last night’s sandwich from outside the bathroom door, having declared this moment to be ‘the fullness of time’, Cassie went down the staircase. Around half way down, she noticed that the hallway had rather more shoes strewn around it than usual. In fact, according to Cassie’s rough count, approximately all of her and Sarah’s shoes were tastefully sprinkled around the floor. She didn’t recall events 100% clearly, but she was fairly sure she had not in fact been wearing all the shoes she owned last night. Quite aside from the trouble she would have faced in fitting them all onto her feet, she would have clashed horribly with herself; there’s no way Sarah would have let that fly. The sheer volume of shoes involved here implied that this was an endeavour of passion and determination, and there was no good explanation for that. Unfortunately, Cassie knew from experience that the lack of a good explanation for what she was seeing often meant that there was only a bad one; bad explanations are often worse than no explanation at all.
The shoe situation didn’t need to be dealt with right now, much like the soggy leggings – the priority call had already been made to sate her perishing thirst, of which Cassie had become cognizant whilst sneaking around the bedroom. She waded through the footwear lake, leaving a wake of sling-backs and causing a bough-wave of open-toed sandals, and entered the kitchen.
Clearly, things had not run smoothly last night when she had been attempting to relieve her crippling hunger. In many ways, this should have been anticipated not only from Cassie’s choice of shoe distribution and sleeping quarters, but also the fact that the sandwich had been casually abandoned outside of the bathroom door. The kitchen was in disarray; cupboard doors were open, dirty glasses covered the work surface, and packets of crisps and biscuits were dangling out of cupboards precariously or scattered around the room. Interspersed among the many used cups and plates from the night before were straws, cutlery, and items from Cassie’s handbag. Half a cucumber had been crammed into the spigot of the kettle, the majority of a lettuce was sprinkled across the floor, and the butter was bobbing merrily along in the sink – a yellow plastic vessel, holding the souls of hydrogenated sink-farers in melted memorial. Cassie wasn’t sure what she felt the most: remorse that she’d have to go out to get more butter, or proud that drunk-Cassie had been responsible enough to try to do the washing up. It was a bit of a moot point though, because either way this evidence HAD to be destroyed before Sarah became aware of it. It wasn’t so much a telling-off that Cassie feared, as the relentless piss-taking which would surely follow.
Cassie grabbed the cucumber, and found that it had been thoroughly buttered, presumably in some kind of inebriated zeal. Begrudgingly, Cassie had to admit that there was a distorted logic to the situation – a well-greased cucumber had a much greater chance of making it into the kettle. The motivation for trying to achieve that end goal was doomed to remain a mystery, however. Grimacing, but accepting that what’s done is done, Cassie decided that she should simply wipe the cucumber clean and forget that this whole sorry mess ever happened. In reaching for the kitchen roll, she discovered that the fates had other plans for her – it was gone, leaving her clutching a buttery sandwich-filler and many, many regrets. She couldn’t just put the cucumber back on the side, because that would get butter everywhere and probably soil the dairy-coated article further. She especially wasn’t going to use the sink because that would involve one or both of the cucumber and her hand entering the cold, untrustworthy water. She had to find the kitchen roll.
It hadn’t been in the bathroom, so that was one potential hiding place out. The landing had also been clear, as far as Cassie remembered, but the bedroom had been dark, and therefore little data had been gathered. On balance, though, Cassie didn’t think it was terribly likely that Sarah would have taken the kitchen roll to bed with her. There was a possibility that the kitchen roll had been scuttled and sunk beneath the surface of the shoe-lake, but there was no way Cassie was going to risk getting her shoes buttery. The most logical place to begin her search was the living room, so off she waded, back through the shoes, to find her absorbent prize.
The living room curtains were drawn shut. Cassie used her free hand to pull them open and allow the sunshine to spill into the room from the back garden. This also allowed the cereal box which had, for reasons lost in time, been sitting atop the curtain pole to drop down onto her head.
“AAAH!” Cassie shouted understandably, having not expected breakfast to perform an aerial strike on her. The cornflakes crunched to the ground, spilling slightly onto the laminate, and Cassie eyed them askance.
“Why?” she muttered to herself in distress, before cracking a smile and giggling to herself.
The morning light unveiled the living room, which seemed to have escaped relatively unscathed from the night’s shenanigans. The sofas were still intact, the TV was thankfully unbroken, and there was relatively little mess of which to speak. The cushions had be rearranged onto the floor, but that wasn’t the end of the world. Scanning around the room, a flash of white caught Cassie’s eye, and she saw the kitchen roll nestled underneath the coffee table. It seemed rather happy there; not mopping up spilt drinks or sauces, but having a little rest on the floor. Cassie wasn’t going to judge it for that – she’d been in a far worse position only a few minutes ago.
Taking care not to butter the coffee table or the floor with her cucumber, Cassie knelt down and reached underneath the coffee table to retrieve the kitchen roll. She took hold of one edge and yanked it out, unspooling several feet of it as she did so. Standing up again, the loose sheets were trailing along the ground, even when she lifted the roll above her head. This was no good to her at all – all achieved was losing the use of her free hand, and she still lack the ability to wipe the cucumber clean. Cassie looked from one hand to the other, assessing her possible routes forward, and with a frustrated groan she admitted defeat – she would seek the aid of a slightly more responsible adult and wake up Sarah.
Deflated, Cassie plodded her way back up the stairs and into the bedroom, kitchen roll drifting along behind her like the train of an absorbent wedding dress. Sarah was still sprawled out across the bed, washed ashore by the gallons of wine she’d surfed home on last night. Lifeguard Cassie had chosen the buttered cucumber and loose kitchen roll as resuscitation aids – the potential definitely existed that she was unqualified.
“Sarah?” Cassie called softly. “Sarah, are you awake?”
Sarah continued breathing heavily, which was her usual way of saying no.
“Sarah, I think I need your help. Sarah. Sarah.” Still nothing. Actions speak louder than words, however, so Cassie was practically screaming when she balanced precariously on one leg and poked Sarah with her foot.
“Ungg.” Sarah complained.
“Sarah?” Cassie asked again, feeling pretty sure that she was addressing the correct person, but enquiring anyway.
“Hnng, yeah?” Sarah replied sleepily.
“I think I need some help.” Cassie told her sheepishly. Sarah open her eyes and looked towards Cassie.
“What the Christ are… is that a cucumber?”
“Er, yeah. I’ve got some kitchen roll too.”
Sarah spluttered out a laugh. “Of course you have. They’re very nice; I’m glad you’ve brought them up here to meet me. Why do you need my help?”
“Well, the cucumber is covered in butter and-“
Sarah began cackling.
“-and I can’t put it down to break off the kitchen roll to wipe it clean.” Cassie finished, sincerely.
Sarah looked up and saw the trail of kitchen roll leading towards the door, then fell back onto the bed laughing even harder. Cassie relaxed slightly, feeling that the risk of a cutting was now negligible.
After a minute or so of alternately trying to compose herself, looking back at Cassie, and then folding up in laughter, Sarah sat up again. She examined Cassie more closely, from the buttery cucumber to the streamer of kitchen roll, and what appeared to be cornflakes in her bedraggled hair. ‘Poor little Chicky.’ She thought.
“OK… OK… come here, let me help you with that. Give me the kitchen roll and keep the butter away from the duvet. How do you get yourself into these situations?” she pleaded with a grin, as she began gathering up the unfurled paper towels.
“I went downstairs and made the mistake of trying to tidy up. Then the cornflakes fell on my head.”
“How did the cornfl-“
“They fell off the curtain rail in the living room.”
Sarah collapsed in laughter again. “I remember that! I remember getting in and you telling me how much you needed snacks. So we went into the kitchen and searched for something to eat in the cupboards, but you said you were also… what was it… “far too weary for these shenanigans”, so you had to go sit down in the living room to come to terms with how tired and hungry you were.”
Cassie smiled as the memory limped its way back into her mind. “I remember going to sit down, now that you mention it.”
“Yeah, you went in there and I thought that you’d maybe like some cornflakes – mostly because they were the first thing I saw and I just wanted to go to bed, truth be told – so I went to the door and threw them at you.”
“And you missed so badly that they landed on the curtains?” Cassie sniggered.
“Not quite, my love.” Sarah replied with a smirk. “Rather than catching the thing you’d asked me to give you, you decided to defend yourself and deflect it like a volleyball. You caught it so badly that it landed on the curtains.” She finished triumphantly.
Cassie started to put her head in her hands and promptly wiped butter on her cheek.
“Uggghh” she squealed. “Please Sarah.”
Unable to ignore the desperate pleas of her greased fiancée any longer, Sarah swung herself out of bed and tore off a sheet of kitchen roll for cucumber reconditioning. She then got back into the bed to watch and mock as appropriate.
“Thanks Sarah.” Cassie said quietly, with a note of amusement and a symphony of embarrassment.
“Any time you need me to bail you out of a spread and vegetable situation, I’ll be there. I think it’s time you told me how you got yourself into this mess though.”
Wiping the cucumber over, Cassie replied “Well, I tried it to pick it up, and it was buttery. Then I tried to pick up the kitchen roll and it was a bit, erm, tumbly.”
“And how did the cucumber come to be buttery?”
Cassie toyed with speculating about lubrication for kettle ingress, then decided that no good would come of admitting to that. “I don’t really remember.”
A disbelieving look from Sarah implied that her explanation was insufficient.
“I don’t!” Cassie protested.
“Well I didn’t do it, so you must have.”
“Well, yeah. I’m pretty it sure it will have been me. I guess it was when I was making my sandwich, perhaps I was over-enthusiastic with the spreading.”
“Or pre-buttered the cucumber to save time on a subsequent sandwich?” Sarah offered.
“Yeah, maybe.” The cucumber was now clean, and Cassie was admiring her handiwork.
“Was the sandwich nice?”
“I can’t comment on its flavour, but it felt pretty horrible when I stepped on it this morning.”
Sarah laughed again. “I love you Cassie. Never change.” She said when she’d regained some composure.
“I had a foody foot OK! It happens; leave me alone about it!” Cassie replied, attempting to be grumpy but failing not to grin. “I love you too.” She added after a pause. “Anyway, I need to finish clearing up downstairs; why don’t you just stay in bed?”
Sarah eyed Cassie suspiciously. “What don’t you want me to see? How bad is it down there?”
“I came up here with a buttery cucumber, how bad do you think it is?” Cassie answered, brandishing her cleaned vegetable at Sarah.
A heavy sigh was the only answer Cassie received. Sarah closed her eyes, nodded her head and laid back down. Cassie picked up the kitchen roll from the bed, kissed Sarah on the cheek, and returned downstairs.
Back in the kitchen, Cassie returned the cucumber to the fridge and surveyed the situation facing her. It would have been a tedious enough task anyway, but with an unknown layer of additional sandwich mess to account for, clearing up could stretch into the hours.
‘Can I really be bothered with this on my own?’ Cassie thought to herself. ‘Sarah won’t mind helping me that much. Although she must be tired and want to sleep. She won’t want to get up to face... this. And the years of ridicule may not be worth it.’
Conflicted, and staring deeply into the SS butter, which was resting calmly on the sink-water’s surface, Cassie’s ears pricked to the sound of footsteps from above – Sarah was getting up anyway. There was no way to hide the filth in time – she would have to accept her fate and face Sarah’s reaction. Cassie felt a small pang of guilt that Sarah would end up helping her clean the mess whatever happened, even though she deserved a day off, but it was still caught in a deadly combat with her desire for an easier task.
Scrabbling in futility, Cassie grabbed a handful of lettuce leaves from the floor and stuffed them into a pint glass – that was a much better place for them. As she then attempted to hide the glass behind some empty wine bottles, however, she heard a shout from the staircase.
“MY SHOES!” Sarah cried, thundering down the stairs. “Why are my shoes all over the floor? Cassie?”
Cassie left the glass where it was and rushed to the kitchen doorway.
“I don’t know. I don’t remember doing it – I thought it might have been you.” She postulated. The look on Sarah’s face, somewhere between horrified, confused, and sceptical, informed Cassie that the redistribution of footwear on such a scale was not something with which she would have involved herself.
“I don’t remember doing it either, and I don’t recall wading through my nice heels to get to bed.”
Cassie shrugged. “I don’t see why I’d have done it. It would have taken ages and all I was concerned about was snacks. Unless I tried to eat the shoes instead – are there bite marks on any of them?”
Sarah looked stonily at Cassie. “If there are bite marks on my shoes, I think we can agree that you won’t want me to see them.”
“You really think I’d bite your shoes?” Cassie shot back, a little hurt at the accusation of being a cobbler-gobbler.
“No smoke without fire.” Sarah defended. She then paused thoughtfully, for longer than Cassie felt was necessary. “Although it doesn’t sound like something you’d do, no.”
“Good.”
“I need some water in any case – can I get through to the kitchen please?”
Cassie tensed. The kitchen filth had been given much higher priority in terms of being hidden from Sarah than the shoes, and so she feared a proportionately worse response.
“I can get that for you.” Cassie spluttered too quickly. “Don’t you want to go back to bed?”
Sarah’s eyes narrowed. “What are you hiding in there?”
“Nothing! Nothing. I just thought that you might want to lie down after the shoe shock.”
Sarah considered this answer for a couple of seconds. “Bullcrap.” Came her insightful assessment. “Let me see what’s going on.”
Like a surefooted mountain goat, Sarah navigated the loose rocks of footwear and stepped into the kitchen. She then curled up on the floor, in a nest of lettuce, laughing at the mayhem to which she had borne witness.
“Wha… what is wrong with you?” Sarah managed to splutter breathlessly, between bouts of cackling.
“I clearly struggled, alright? We both know it.” Cassie gracefully conceded. Sarah gradually regained control, stood back up, and put her hand on Cassie’s shoulder.
“It’s OK baby – sandwich-making out-foxes even the best of us.” Sarah told her mockingly.
“Oh, shut your face.”
“No, I mean it. It makes perfect sense to throw the lettuce everywhere in the room. Some of it is bound to land on the bread sooner or later.”
Cassie crossed her arms grumpily. “See, this is exactly why I wanted to hide it from you.”
“Aww, cheer up Chicky.” Sarah told her with a wry smile. “I’m only playing.” Cassie eyed her suspiciously – when Sarah was feeling playful it generally meant that there was no end in sight to the constructive jibes. At least the guilt of letting Sarah get up to help had faded to nothing.
“Besides” Sarah continued “who could possibly be sad when you’ve got a whole pint of lettuce to enjoy?” She thrust the glass of leaves merrily into the air and then bent over in a fit of giggles again.
“Well I’m glad you’re having fun.” Cassie said sarcastically, failing to avoid smirking as she did so.
“There’s nothing I like waking up to more than a ruined kitchen and wet butter.”
“Don’t forget a buttery kettle.” Cassie reminded her.
“Eh?” Sarah replied with intrigue. Cassie pointed at the kettle and Sarah sighed. “How did this happen?”
“Where do you think the cucumber came from?”
Sarah slapped her hands to her face. “There aren’t words, Cassie. There just aren’t words.”
“Not even, ‘Wow, I’m impressed?’” Cassie asked optimistically.
“Not quite, my love. Not quite. Breakfast?”
“I could murder a fry up. But I think that would involve clearing all this up first…” Cassie’s expression betrayed no desire to engage in such an activity. With her antics already rumbled, there was no longer any motivation to hide the evidence of her nocturnal misdeeds.
“Hmm. Yes it would. I think this situation can bear to wait until we’re feeling more responsible. Café? My treat – you’ve given me so much already this morning, I feel the need to repay you. Besides, you’ve already got our shoes out for us so we’re basically ready to go.”
“You’re not going to stop this any time soon, are you?”
“Almost certainly not.” Sarah informed Cassie with a grin.
“Then I’d rather be ridiculed over breakfast than the washing up. I guess. Let’s go.” Cassie said decisively, grabbing Sarah’s hand. Unfortunately for Sarah, Cassie hadn’t washed it since holding the cucumber.
“Ugh! Cassie!” was how Sarah chose to articulate her distaste.
“What’s done is done!” she responded, and so they left; hand-in-buttery-hand.
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